LEGO como sistema de juego: 1954 – 1977

As noted in Chapters 3 and 5, Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council (MBC) now monitors on nationality for all housing applications, an initiative in part stimulated by the arrival of new migrants in the area, identified as principally Eastern European and also secondary migrants from Europe, mainly Somalis. Bolton MBC also has a

growing refugee population, through asylum dispersal and the government-sponsored Gateway refugee protection programme which brings United Nations recognised refugees directly to the UK from refugee camps in Africa and Asia. It has also commissioned research into these new migrant communities, which focuses on housing (among other issues) and will report shortly. Bolton MBC is also involved in an Opening Doors project by the Housing Associations Charitable Trust, supported by the Housing Corporation and DCLG, which aims to improve housing association service delivery to migrants and refugees. It reports a lot of anecdotal evidence that associations refuse to house working migrants or those with time limits on their stay, even though they are not constrained by eligibility legislation and such refusals are likely to constitute indirect but unlawful discrimination.

There is also concern that some communities may be particularly vulnerable to exploitation by poor landlords in the private sector, and that there may be distinct ethnic differences. In Glasgow, Sheffield and Bolton, Roma communities from different accession states have been reported as living in particularly overcrowded conditions without access to basic facilities. They face difficulties in accessing advice and advocacy to deal with the undoubted housing problems they encounter.

Language barriers are made worse by literacy problems and are combined with a distrust of authority and local authorities’ confusion over the eligibility of accession migrants. They also face double hostility from some sections within the local

community, both as a new hate subject (as Eastern Europeans) and an old one (as Roma).

A crop of new work on Eastern European migrants (Markova and Black, 2007;

Spencer et al, 2007; Robinson et al, 2007; Phillimore et al, 2007) has provided some useful detail, especially in the two most recent studies that look at localities

(Robinson in Sheffield and Phillimore in the East Midlands). Spencer found that 44 per cent of the migrants interviewed were sharing a room and a third of them had moved in the last eight months, although agricultural workers reported a higher level of satisfaction with their accommodation (which is more regulated) than others.

Robinson examined the ‘housing careers’ of four groups of new immigrants: two mainly refugee communities (Liberian and Somali), one arriving to join a more settled community (Pakistani) and one new migrant (Polish). He identified typical ‘housing careers’ and found that:

• The housing situations and experiences of new immigrants represent a composite of the familiar experiences of various disadvantaged groups within the housing system.

• The opportunities for new immigrants to effect a positive change in their housing situation are distinct and different from those of other disadvantaged groups.

He identified the policy framework and legal system as key factors in this disadvantage, rather than, for example, cultural or locality factors. But he also pointed out that, until their longer residence begins to ‘iron out’ these legal

differences, it will not be possible to see whether other discrimination, such as that on the grounds of race or religion, begins to have a greater impact. Although the

samples were fairly evenly divided among men and women, no findings were made in relation to gender. All immigrants in the study were between 20 and 55 years old and none reported any disabilities.

Zaronaite and Tirzite (2006) reported migrants describing unfair treatment that is probably discrimination in the housing sector, mostly by estate agents. Migrant workers stated that estate agents refused to rent property to them without giving reasons and that they had been treated disrespectfully. Phillimore and Goodson (2008) looked in detail at A8 migrants in the East Midlands and found:

• Excessive rent levels and poor quality of accommodation.

• Poor knowledge about rights and entitlements.

• Local authority reluctance to deal with the housing needs of migrant workers (in relation to homelessness).

Other work has been less detailed or conclusive. Babaylan (2007) identified housing as a significant problem for women Filipina migrants. The Shelter (2007) report

looked at access to advice, but the small sample included a range of ethnic minority communities, not just migrants. Although they sought to interview significant numbers of young people (and some older ones) the report did not identify any specific

problems or discrimination faced by different age groups. One informant cited

religious discrimination as a factor, but this was then identified as a cultural barrier in the report. There are no references to sexual orientation in any of the work on

housing and migrants studied so far. It is identified as a particular difficulty in terms of collecting data by workers with migrants, who report a reluctance by staff to ask the question and by service users to answer it.

7.5 Conclusions

There is little available data that provides a reliable picture of housing conditions, pathways, decisions and outcomes for migrants. The available statistical data is partial, and does not tell us about the axes of discrimination, with the possible exception of race, with some information about nationality or country of birth.

Research is similarly patchy, much of it focused on Eastern Europeans, and saying little about gender, age, disability, religion or sexual orientation.

The available figures and research point to likely discrimination in both the social and private sectors, and anecdotal evidence indicates similar problems in housing

associations. The outcome is, as reported in various pieces of research, that many migrant communities live in very poor, insecure and overcrowded conditions.

8 Health

Research on health and migration raises a number of issues concerning the health and health care needs of migrants, and their access to and usage of services.

However in the UK, the little research that exists has mainly focused on asylum seekers and refugees, with little on new migrants²³. There is some evidence suggesting that migration generates distinct patterns of illness, arising from stress, isolation and lack of access to community and primary health services. Migrant workers are also believed to suffer twice the rate of workplace accidents and

occupational disease as the rest of the population (Migrant Rights Network Scotland, 2008)²⁴. Racist literature often focuses on the perceived health risks incurred by migration. The Health Protection Agency’s first report on infectious diseases affecting migrants (Gilbert and Jones, 2006) is based on data from England, Wales and

Northern Ireland for 2004 on non-UK born cases of a variety of infectious diseases. It shows that many migrants to the UK are at no greater risk of infectious diseases than the UK-born population.

This chapter examines the data available on migration and health, the specific needs of migrants, their differential access to and use of services and the extent to which we have knowledge about health inequalities in relation to social divisions.